"Great Commandment Politics" (Mark 12:28-34)

 

Watch it here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zAViBZ0Kkmg

Sunday, September 27, 2020

 

            Our politics must be tied directly to the great commandment.  The Great Commandment only makes sense if we understand God intends to say everyone.  Jesus went to the cross because “God so love the world;” not part of the world but all of it, everyone. 

            What is the ‘Great Commandment?’  From the mouth of Jesus, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.”  He’s quoting Deuteronomy 6:4. This has been God’s top priority for us from the beginning.  Next, quoting Leviticus 19:18, Jesus says, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.  There is no other commandment greater than these” (Mark 12:29-31). 

            Wait, wait!  Time out, Jesus.  We wanted 1 – the greatest commandment.  You gave 2!  He’s allowed to do that. He’s Jesus.  He gives them together, because we can only understand them together.  We can only truly love God when we love our neighbor.  It is impossible to truly love God if we fail to love our neighbor.  So, racism, conscious or unconscious, makes it impossible to love God because it is a failure to love our neighbor.  Holding others in contempt, for whatever reason, makes God-love impossible.  If you hold someone in contempt, you have elevated yourself above him; you have failed to love him.  Loving God means loving people.  The way we approach politics shows whether or not we truly love people. 

            I don’t mean the American political scene.  It is abhorrent when churches and pastors align with one party or the other, or a third party.  Many in our church family and many listening to this have strong political convictions which may lead you to hear this message and conclude I am against your party or for your party.  It’s not so.  I am not advocating for or against any candidate or party. 

Partisan politics have no place in church.  This is God’s time.  We have to contemplate how God calls us, His church, to relate to each other and to the world.  Politics refers to people.  So, as Christ-followers, our politics have to be love-based.  It’s the only way Christ allows.  Of the many significant obstacles to love, I will briefly touch on 3, using as a source chapter 4 of the book Crossing the Lines we Draw by theologian and pastor Matthew Tennant. 

First: fear.  Fear drives us to objectify others.  Fear prevents us from seeing others as people – people God calls us to love.  Fear leads me to hoard resources and prevents me from sharing.  I forget that we all need food, shelter, healthcare, clothing, and community; instead, I make sure I have enough.  I even store extras to make sure I’ll have more than enough in the future.  Fear turns my generosity into greed as I ignore everyone else and look out only for myself. 

Tennant uses the example of terrorism to illustrate the way fear distorts our perspective.  He quotes an American politician who, a few years ago said, “We will … unite the civilized world against radical Islamic terrorism, which we will eradicate completely from the face of the earth” (p.41).  It’s a patently absurd statement because terrorism is a technique, not an individual or even a group.  Most Muslims are not terrorists.  Many terrorists are not Muslim; some are white American.  But fear leads us to demonize radical Islamic terrorists, whoever they are.  Fear leads us to objectify groups of people or regions of the world. 

In Matthew 5 Jesus says,  “I say to you love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you. … If anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also” (Matthew 5:44, 39).  That’s the Jesus, red letters!  His teaching and his commands get drowned out by the illogical noise our fears produce.  So, who do you fear?  Protestors or looters?  Political liberals or conservatives? Submit your fears to God. Ask Him to give you the courage to love those you fear or hold in contempt.  Empowered by the Holy Spirit, we overcome fear by, loving those we would never love.  The ‘other’ is no longer an object of our judgment, but instead a recipient of our love.

A second obstacle to Great Commandment politics is the sense that life is a zero-sum game.  Tennant points out a zero-sum game requires winners and losers (p.49).  For you and I to be winners, we have to beat others.  We advance at the expense of others.  A zero-sum game favors individual advancement over cooperation and mutual gain. 

Picture it.  Five thousand people on a hillside have listened to Jesus for hours.  His words are so rich, no one will leave.  Practical-minded Philip, one of the 12, wants to know how they’re going to feed this crowd the size of a small town (John 6:5).  Andrew, the matchmaker of the 12, sees a kid munching a loaf of bread. 

“A lot of hungry people here,” he says to the kid.  The kid nods.  “You going to eat all of that?”  Andrew asks. 

The kid nods yes. Then he says to Andrew, “At least I got mine!”

That’s not how the story goes!  The kid offers to share his lunch, and we get to see the way God multiplies our small offerings; Jesus miraculously feeds 5000 people with one boy’s meal.  We give what have to support each other and help those with nothing, and God multiplies it.  This is not socialism; this is Great Commandment politics.  Share.  Give.  Make sure everyone is included, cared for, and empowered.  Guided by love, we reject the zero-sum game approach and instead look for ways we can give of ourselves for the good of others.  Jesus gave his all for us on the cross.  We imitate Him, our savior, by giving of ourselves.

So far, in connecting love with politics, we have seen two movements.  We reject fear by seeing the “other” whomever we mean by “other” as someone to love, not someone to despise.  Second, we reject the competitive idea of a zero-sum game in favor of cooperation and mutual blessing.  We do this by sharing and trusting God to take what we give and bless others with it.  What’s third obstacle to love we need to overcome?  False narratives. 

Tennant refers to a couple TV shows from the 1950’s, Ozzie and Harriet, and Leave it to Beaver.  Both are fine shows that depict an idealized America, if idealized America is a 1950’s white, working class nuclear family: mom, dad, two kids.  Sometimes this era is referred to as The Greatest Generation.  This is the generation of my parents and my grandparents.  However, the picture is of a particular type of family situation; but that’s not the only picture from that time period.

America back then was great, for some people; not for all.  Read the history of how stridently white people all over the country, not just the south, but all over resisted integrating public schools.  If you have a conscience and you’re willing to honestly read the history, you’ll be horrified.  Read about the racism against Asians coming to America during that time.

Tennant also points out that these beloved old shows fail to delve into the depths of Appalachia and the Southern literary tradition, a white cultural heritage that went ignored.  What makes America “great” is in the eye of the beholder.  As followers of Jesus, we have to tell the truth in the face of distorted narratives. 

The 1950’s, the 1980’s, today – none of it is a golden age.  Until Jesus returns, the world is a fallen place where women and men of every nation are lost and dying in sin, cut off from the love of God, cut off by their own choices.  The politics of love drive us to tell the truth about sin.  The politics of love compel us to help people find their way to the Savior, our Lord, Jesus.

We overcome fear by committing to love, even love our enemies.

We reject the zero-sum game in favor of cooperation and mutual blessing.

We expose false narratives by speaking the truth in love, even when the truths we expose are inconvenient and uncomfortable. 

Love of God and love of neighbor comes to full fruition in the most quoted of Bible passages, John 3:16-17.  Jesus says, “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.  Indeed, God did not send the son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.”

“The world” means everyone.  That so-called radical Islamic terrorist; Jesus wants to be with him for eternity.  That person in Portland you saw on the news, the one throwing a Molotov cocktail at the police; Jesus loves him.  That Aryan white supremacist advocating for the purity of the white race; he’s shouting, red-faced, at an antifa protestor, who shouts right back, louder.  Jesus died for them both.  Jesus died for George Floyd and Derek Chauvin, for Michael Brown and Darren Wilson, for Trayvon Martin and George Zimmerman.  God so loved the world, means everyone.

The cross shows that Jesus is for everyone.  Do you want to stand with Jesus?  You can stand against racism, against terrorism, and against hatred.  We are for people – black people, Arabic people, southern whites, Yankees, Canadians, Republicans and Democrats, everyone. 

Jesus gives the Great Commandment to love God and love people in the midst of a series of contentious public debates.  He debates with Pharisees, Sadducees, and a group called Herodians.  Each group attempts to outsmart Jesus and catch him in some inconsistency.  Like today’s political reporters, they try to trip Jesus up, but they always fail and end up with egg on their own faces. 

One guy though, described as a “scribe” (Mk 12:28), most likely a Sadducee, asks Jesus a legitimate question.  Which is the greatest commandment?  Jesus tells him he must love God and love neighbor.  A light goes on in this Sadducee’s mind.  “You’re right, teacher,” he says.  Jesus can see that unlike the others, his heart is true and Jesus says to the scribe, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.”

That’s where I want to be, close to the Kingdom.  I want you there with me.  Commitment to the Great Commandment puts us on the path.  Right now, our country is mired in the worst of political seasons.  It’s an opportunity for us to bear witness to the goodness of God by sharing the love of Jesus, in our thoughts, our words, and our actions.  May we do that.  May we obey the command to love, answer the call of love, and win people over to Jesus with hearts, words, and deeds of love. 

  AMEN

Growing Young/Best Neighbors

Sunday, June 16, 2019

            Religion is about rules.  Christianity is not a religion, it’s a relationship.  What an absurd statement!  When you look at the census form, where it says “religion,” Christianity is right there as one of the choices.  Doesn’t Christianity have rules?

What does Jesus say about this?

When asked what commandment (a/k/a “rule’) was the greatest, Jesus went straight to the rule book – the Law of Moses found in Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, the first five books of the Bible. 

            A Pharisee lawyer asked Jesus, “Teacher, which commandment is greatest” (22:36)?  Jesus responded by quoting Deuteronomy 6:5. “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.”  This was not originally from Jesus.  He got this from Moses.  He doesn’t say anything about relationship.  This is a rule.  According to Jesus it is the rule, and if we want to follow him we are commanded to obey it. 

            Then, he adds a second rule which he says is like the first.  “Love your neighbor as yourself.”  Again, this is not a Jesus original.  He’s quoting the Law of Moses here, Leviticus 19:18.  God says there, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord.”  That’s the rule.  Why?  God is Lord, Master, and God says so.  That’s all the reason we get. 

A lot Christians kind of ignore much of Leviticus because the instruction is a set of guidelines for sacrificing animals in worship.  We don’t do that.  Because Jesus was the sacrifice to end all sacrifices, we don’t kill animals and sacrifice them to show our devotion to God.  So, Leviticus is disregarded only to be read by the zealous Christians doing one of those read-through-the-Bible-in-a-year plans, and they read it quickly so they get to more interesting stories in Joshua and Judges.  When Jesus was asked what matters most, he quoted Leviticus and Deuteronomy. He gave rules, rules that were already in place: love God and love neighbor.

So is Christianity a religion of rule, specifically these two rules?  So many Christians base their faith on their relationship with Jesus.  Is it a relationship?  Is it both?

The final core commitment of the Growing Young approach to church ministry is where we will find resolution to this tension.  Our church is committed to the Growing Young idea.  We’ve spent the last month looking at the core commitments of churches that are growing young. 

1.    Shared Leadership

2.    Empathy

3.    Take Jesus Seriously

4.    A Community of Warm Relationships

5.    Prioritize Young People Everywhere

6.    Be Good Neighbors

Growing young churches involve young people in leadership.  They empathize with the struggles young people face.  They prioritize the teachings of Jesus, about Jesus, and the relationship we have with God in Jesus.  They foster an environment in which people can develop deep, true relationships both with peers and intergenerationally.  They prioritize ministries to young people in all areas of church life.  And finally, today’s core commitment: Growing Young Church are good neighbors to the community.  This means we strive to help people in our community thrive.  We hope many unchurched people will come to our church.  We hope many unbelievers will encounter our ministry and through that encounter decide to put their trust in Jesus.  Whether they do or not, we want to be a force for God’s good in our community and in the world.

In many ways we are already doing this.  Earlier this year, we built a ramp for a family living about a mile from here.  We do ramp projects like that almost every year.  The middle school a block from here uses our parking lot when they need overflow parking, like this past Thursday when they had 8^th grade promotion.  We are also the school designated site in the event that an emergency would cause them to evacuate students.  Numerous churches in our community use our facility for funerals and banquets.  We do charge for some, not all but some, of these building uses, but those who pay are glad to do so.  They say our fees are among the most reasonable in Chapel Hill and they love using our space.  Our helping hand ministry is there for people in financial emergencies. 

These are just a few of the ways we try to be good neighbors.   Young people and unchurched people pay attention to the words we speak about Jesus when they see us doing good in the world.  Helping kids in Ethiopia get an education and job skills; sending backpacks loaded with needed school supplies and gifts to extremely poor families in Appalachia; hosting big events like Vacation Bible School and the Chinese New Year celebration and inviting the community; inviting the community to our Christmas Eve and Easter services; hosting the mobile dental clinic so low income families can get free dental care: in all these ways we strive to obey Jesus’ command to love our neighbors. 

We can improve the way we do many of the things I’ve mentioned.  We might add ministries, but even if we just did a better job of maximizing what we already do, it would magnify our effectiveness in showing our town what God’s love is like.  All these good works are examples of us trying to obey Jesus’ command to love our neighbors.

When love happens in a way that makes peoples’ lives easier, relationships start to happen.  So there it is.  Obeying the command is following the rule, but it leads to relationship and in the first place we try to be obedient because of the relationship we have with Jesus.  So, Christianity is a relationship, not a religion.  Right?

It doesn’t really matter to me how it’s defined.  I categorize our faith as the Christian religion.  I participate in this religion through ritual like the Lord’s Supper and baptism, a holy book (the Bible), and regular worship.  I try to show religious devotion to God. 

In this religion, which I believe is the path to God, I have found that because my sins are forgiven, I have been adopted as a child of God.  God is my Heavenly father, therefor I have relationship with Him. My relationship with God is more important than any other relationship or loyalty in my life.  I am my best self as a husband, dad, brother, son, friend, and pastor because of who I am in Christ. 

Because of who Jesus is, I want to follow Him.  I want to understand and obey when he says, these commands are the most important.  The words he speaks in Matthew 22 come in a series of confrontations that Jesus had with religious leaders in Jerusalem in the week between Palm Sunday and his crucifixion on Good Friday.

Different powerbrokers in the government and in the temple felt threatened by Jesus.  They tried to control people’s lives and to an extent they succeeded.  Then Jesus came along and severely criticized them.  Sadducees, Herodians, and Pharisees were kind of like political parties vying for the soul of the nation.  They exercised influence through control of the temple and synagogues and through their knowledge of the Law of Moses.  Jesus knew the law better than they did.  He saw these leaders manipulating people with guilt and threats of expulsion from houses of worship and he wouldn’t have it.

Jesus helped people find their way to God. Through healing, driving our demons, and teaching about the law in new ways, he drew his listeners close to God whereas the leaders who contended against him came between people and God.  If we are to be good neighbors, if we as the body of Christ are to help people come to know Jesus, we have to love our community as Jesus loved those who came to him. 

When he quoted the Deuteronomy command to love God, he wasn’t talking about a feeling.  This was not love as an emotion or impulse.  He meant love as a decision.  To love God meant – and still means – to give oneself to God with one’s entire person. 

Do we do that?  How much of you does God get?  How much of me does God get?  Loving God in this way – the way commanded by Jesus – is a lifelong pursuit.  It’s difficult to give oneself entirely to anything: a profession, a romantic relationship, a pastime.  He’s passionate about golf.  Maybe.  To be “passionate” about something is to love so much it hurts.  Does he love golf so much it hurts?  Do we love God so much it hurts?  Are we giving absolutely all of ourselves to God?  That’s what Jesus says is the most important of commandments.  There’s no option to follow him and have Christianity be a small part of our lives.  Loving God the way Jesus says we must is all-consuming.

It is also directly tied to the second great command: love others.  Love your neighbor as yourself.  Again, the verb Jesus used to describe love indicates love is a responsibility.  When we follow Jesus, we have to give ourselves fully to the care of our neighbors.  We do this as a community and as individuals.  Jesus illustrated the point with his Good Samaritan parable.  Anyone you or I come across is our neighbor, one we are commanded by God to love.  Loving in this way gets us to “the essence of the way God created humans to live.”  We give ourselves to God and others to fulfill God’s purpose for us as the crown of creation.[i]   We were made to be in relationships of self-giving love with God and with people.  It’s why we exist.

When we come together as a group of Jesus-followers and together commit to love our community in this way, we will show our neighbors Jesus.  Seeing Him, some will see their own need for Him and turn to Him in faith.  We’ll be a “Growing Young Church.”  More importantly, we will be a faithful church and each one of us will meet Jesus in this gathering.  We will see Him in this place. 

Pray for our church.  Ask God to help us grow young and help us increase our love for each other, for him, and for the world right outside our doors. 

AMEN

---

[i] M. Wilkens (2004).  The NIV Application Commentary: Matthew, Zondervan (Grand Rapids), p.726.

Where We Can Agree (Mark 12:28-34)

            One political group identifies with the man in power.  No matter how foolish he acts, these supporters will stand by his side.  They ignore his boorish behavior as they prop him up claiming he’s best hope for the nation.  They don’t really believe that.  In truth, they plan on sponging off his riches and privilege.  They want to advance themselves by walking in his shadow.  We’ll call them the brownnosers. 

            The brownnosers’ rivals are a group that’s committed to the letter of the law.  They are fully convinced that their interpretation is the only valid one.  They exert power over common people as they wield the law like a sword.  At their word, one is vindicated or condemned.   And everyone listens to them because they seem to know so much. We’ll call them the legalists. 

            The legalists and brownnosers definitely do not like each other.  They constantly clash in public verbal sparring matches.  However, the legalists are at odds with another group, a second rival.  This group holds the seats of power in the ruling body. They actually possess legislative authority.   We can refer to them as congress.  Some of those in congress have loose association with some of the brownnosers.  The actually despise the brownnosers, but are willing to use them, if it maintains their privileged position.

            I’ve tried to be coy, but you are too smart for that.  You can see right through my veiled references.  I’ve mentioned three groups that in different ways hold the people of the nation under heel with their misuse and abuse of power.  Three governing bodies vying with one another, sometimes entering dubious alliances, other times openly attacking each other; we all know exactly who I am talking about.  It is the first century in Jerusalem and I have just described the Pharisees as legalists, the Herodians, sycophantic members of the puppet King Herod’s court, as brownnosers, and the Sadducees who controlled the temple as the congress.

            These power groups had to wrangle under the oppressive eye of Rome the way today’s politicians have to deal with the inevitability of Election Day.  Powerless powerbrokers, they elevated themselves at the expensive of the common person.  And then Jesus broke onto scene with something neither they nor the Romans had anticipated.  He told the truth!  He was real.  He revealed what was real about them.  And this one truth-telling man exposed and disoriented those who had previously thought of themselves as untouchable.

            Follow Mark, the master story teller.  Imagining the scene, I picture this section being read in the home of some Christian in Ephesus 88AD.  A group of Christ-followers is gathered, 30 people.  It is a rich Christian’s home, big enough to host the church in that sector.  Among those 30 there to glorify God in the name of Jesus are the poor, the travelers, the weary and beaten.  They have been harassed by local politicians and constables. They’ve been intimidated by Roman legionnaires.  They’ve been kicked out of the synagogue for insisting that Messianic expectations have been realized in the death and resurrection of Jesus.  They know that to follow him is to be a people abused by society’s powerholders. 

            They come to an Ephesian church maybe hosted by an aged Timothy.  He’s invited an old friend to share a good word: John Mark.  He’s well known having apprenticed under Barnabas and Peter, and near the end having reconciled with and then worked alongside Paul.  We recognize names like Timothy and Mark as being among the younger set of disciples we meet in Acts and Paul’s letters.  But this particular Sabbath Day, it is 50 years past the resurrection.  These men we remember being young are now the last vestiges of the original generation of Jesus-followers.  Where has Mark been?

            With a gleam in his eye he begins reading what he’s been working on – his version of the good news; this is Mark’s Gospel.  By chapter 12, those 30 believers in the Ephesian house church are with him.  He pits the Pharisees in public confrontations with Jesus and the crowd cheers Jesus as he demonstrates wisdom, defeating their tyranny with a Gospel of freedom, overcoming their abusive theology with his Gospel of love and grace.

            Mark has Jesus deflecting all the rhetorical and legal assaults the Pharisees can muster. Defeated, they do something they would never do.  They conspire with the Herodians!  “They sent to [Jesus] some Pharisees and some Herodians to trap him” (12:13).  Jesus meets their absurd scenario and in Mark’s abrupt prose we read, “They were utterly amazed” (12:17).  That’s Mark 12:13-17 if you want to read it later yourself.

            The Sadducees, perceiving themselves to possess a vastly superior intellect to the parochial Pharisees and pompous Herodians, take their turn at Jesus.  They tell an improbable parable about a woman who marries 7 brothers.  They want to disprove resurrection.  All they accomplish is the proof that Jesus is much more adroit than them.  You can read this encounter in Mark 12:18-27.

             The rhythm is easy to pick up. All the corrupt parties of Jerusalem politics have been thrown into an unwelcome alliance in a joint effort to put the village rabbi from Galilee back in his place.  A shot comes at Jesus from one corner, he swats it back byspeaking the bold truth of God.  Another shot comes from over here and Jesus is ready.  Their deceptions won’t slow him down in his determination to reveal God’s salvation to all who come to him genuinely seeking God.

            In the midst of this, Mark throws a curveball we need to see.  Within corrupt political structures whether the systems of 1^st century Jerusalem or 21^st century American politics, there are people who honestly want to serve.  Of the Republicans and Democrats hoping to win this Tuesday, some are truly good men and women.  Maybe you don’t vote for them because you disagree with their views on a certain issue, but you don’t have demonize them.  It’s OK to disagree with civility. 

            Mark writes in verse 28 that a scribe approached Jesus.  Most of the scribes in the temple were probably Sadducees.  This Sadducee watched Jesus go at it with Herodians, Pharisees and other Sadducees to the delight of the crowd.  But this one was annoyed.  He could see that the cheering crowd had no more interest in truth than the corrupt politicians bickering with Jesus.  These people cheering Jesus today would be jeering him as he hung from the cross just a few days later. 

But this man had a real question.  From one thinker to another, “Teacher, which commandment is first?”  If we want to live in right relationship with God and with our fellow human beings, if we want to honor God in our lives, where do we start?  Jesus quotes Deuteronomy 6:4, “Hear O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.”  People think Jesus invented that statement.  He was quoting law they all knew. 

He doesn’t stop though.  He then quotes Leviticus 19:18.  This comes right from the middle of the holiness code, a law they all knew. “Love your neighbor as yourself.”

Mark’s audience in that Ephesian church pastored by Timothy has been laughing along with Mark and Timothy as they all hear Mark tell of Jesus’ flourishes in overcoming the assaults hurled at him by Pharisees, Sadducees, and Herodians.  But they notice the change in Mark’s tone when he gets to this part.  Jesus never won arguments for the sake of winning arguments.  He didn’t want to defeat people. He wanted to enlighten people with truth so they could see their own sins and thus see their need for God.  Seeing their need for God they would then discover the path to God was the way paved by Jesus.

A hush falls over Mark’s audience as they hear him tell of this scribe, a Sadducee who is beginning to open his heart to Jesus.  We might describe the man as a Washington insider.  Mark holds before us the story of this insider stepping onto the path of discipleship through a thinker’s conversation about theology and faith. 

“You are right, Teacher; you have truly said that ‘he is one, and beside him there is no other;’ and ‘to love him with all the heart, and all the understanding, and with all the strength,’ and ‘to love one’s neighbor as oneself,’ – this is more important than all whole burnt offering and sacrifices” (12:33).  Astounding!  A scribe who worked in Jerusalem just said that relationships of love mattered more than temple ceremony.  Where did scribes work?  At the temple.  Who did scribes work with?  Priests!  He’s beginning to see that salvation doesn’t come in what happens in the temple.  Salvation comes when someone meets God in Jesus and responds in faith.  It can be a beggar or the most powerful of lawyers; a wealthy merchant, or a blue collar worker struggling to pay his bills.  Mark shows that in Christ we each come with the same need for grace, love, and forgiveness. 

Jesus did not bat this inquiring scribe away as he had the Herodians and Sadducees in the previous episodes.  Instead, in this instance, Jesus wins.  His victories are marked by the conversion of our hearts to God’s way of life.  God’s way of life is love.  “You are not far from the kingdom of God,” Jesus told that scribe.   He absolutely had to turn away from the temple and turn to Jesus.  And he did that. 

Then Mark writes, “After that, no one dared ask any [more] questions.”  Mark glanced around at the faces of the house-church members huddled in Ephesus.  He had made his point.  Those late first century Christ-followers needed to love the Legionnaires who intimidated them and the local constables who harassed them, and the synagogue leader who rejected and expelled them.  When they looked to Jesus and loved God, they could all agree on that.

We can too.  So many issues cause us to argue with each other, even our brothers and sisters in church; we argue, then we demonize the other side; then we divide the world into “us” and “them.”  This hateful bipolar way of seeing is one philosophy trying to win the day – this Election Day and in this moment in history.  Some arguments are fun: Pepsi or Coke?  Cats or dogs?  Apple or PC?  Tar Heels or Blue Devils?  Some arguments are more deeply divisive.  Do we welcome refugees or secure our borders with the military?  Can gay people get married in the church?  Can we own guns and defend ourselves or are we supposed to turn the other cheek? 

The demonic monster of political corruption wants us to turn on each other by forcing us to divide into camps based on these and other issues.  Mark promises we don’t have to fall for that.  We can be united in Christ.  Our starting point, and this is absolute, is loving God and loving each other.  This is something we can all agree on.  My neighbor is the person God puts in my path and I am called to love him as much as God showed love for me in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus.

Mark’s audience understood that the love of God revealed in Jesus is the remedy for the ills that divide people in society.  They would take that Gospel he wrote and left with them.  Centuries before the printing press, they would preserve it, by hand copy it, translate it, and live by it.  Why?  They knew this writing was Spirit-inspired.  This was word of God.  This was life. 

I think we know it too.  We reproduce Mark’s Gospel when we respond to the corruption and fearmongering around us with a commitment to love and Godly hospitality.  As Election Day approaches, may we do that this week.  May we go out in love, determined to love people in such a way that they see their own deep need for Jesus.

AMEN

Among Muslims

On Sabbatical from my normal duties as senior pastor, I have examined race relations in America because I think that the church in America should be where black and white, Asian and Hispanic, Arab and Native American people come together.  How do we lead the church to be that uniting space where people delight in one another, celebrating our differences and rejoicing in our shared life in Christ?

            While race has been the topic of my study (through reading and interviews with church leaders), I am aware that followers of Jesus in America also need to set a tone of love and peace in relation to Muslims.  Many high profile “evangelicals”[i] have been downright hateful in their stance toward Muslims.  This antipathy is combined with woeful ignorance.  I pray that a part of my church’s renewal and step toward multiethnic worship and community will be the witness of peace and love extended to Muslims.

            Here, I offer my own experiences, which I grant are limited.

            First, I have traveled in a town that is 70-80% Muslim.  Each year from 2011-2016, I have spent time in Kombolcha, Ethiopia.  There, I have been a part of the Children’s Hope Chest work that provides school uniforms, school supplies, meals, and other support to extremely poor children and their families.  The CHC program is run out of a church and part of the curriculum is the presentation of the Gospel.  In my times there, I have never been confronted or threatened by any of the 180,000 Muslims who live there.  I do not know of any of our kids in the program who have suffered because they are participating in a Christian program.  It is has been peaceful and safe. 

            Second, shortly after the election of President Trump, his attempts at travel bans from 7 majority-Muslim countries, and the fears aroused in American Muslim communities, one of our church members reached out to a Mosque in Durham, NC.  Her efforts lead to me actually speaking at an ecumenical event there.  The hospitality was generous.  I felt welcomed and the Holy Spirit led me to publically repent on behalf of Christians for the ways we have failed to show love to our Muslim neighbors.  My repentance was graciously received.

            Third, as I blogged earlier this summer, I read A Common Word (editor, Miroslav Volf).  In this book, I learned that Muslims place as high a value on the two great commandments as do Christians.  Love of God and love of neighbor are central tenets of Islam.

            Fourth, as a part of our Sabbatical, my family had the opportunity to travel to Egypt.  There I learned that no one dislikes the Muslim Brotherhood and ISIS more than your average everyday Egyptian.  Cairo is an enormous Muslim city (over 20,000,000 people).  From the rooftop of the Barcelo Hotel, you can hear Mosques across the city issue the call to prayer.  It echoes through the canyons of buildings.  As in Kombolcha, I felt safe, and never threatened.  Now, I need to acknowledge that the people who worked so hard to assure my comfort there are in the tourism business.  They need my dollars and they need me to come home to the U.S.A. and put in a good word for them.  They are financially motivated to makes things nice for Americans willing to spend money.  Even so, I met others not a part of that business.

            One day, we were enjoying the rooftop pool, a cool relief from the unrelenting sun’s heat, and I met a man from Bagdad, Iraq.  He and I discussed religion and life in Iraq.  He felt that my wife and I, as adoptive parents, were a blessing from God.  He was charming and genuine. He is an engineer and was in Cairo for a conference.  He had no personal gain in being nice to me.  His kindness was just that, kindness.

            These experiences through reading, conversation, and the receiving of generous hospitality lead me to think that Muslims are people just like my neighbors in Chapel Hill are people.  Some Muslims are terrorists – a few.  So too are some of the members of Westboro Baptist Church.  I don’t condemn all Baptists as terrorists because of what they do.  Among the 20,000,000 Egyptians in Cairo there are good-hearted people, lazy people, thieves and liars, hard workers, and every variety of humanity you’d find anywhere. 

            It broke my heart to read the Voice of the Martyrs report that more than 100 Coptic Christians have been killed in Egypt.[ii]  There are terrorists Muslims (and terrorist Christians and terrorist Buddhists in South Asia and terrorist Hindus in India).  Most Muslims (and most Christians and Buddhists and Hindus and Jews) are just people, people God has called us to love.  What happened to our Coptic brothers and sisters calls for lament and for prayer.  But it is not an indictment of Egypt any more than Dylan Roof’s villainous act at Mother Emmanuel Church in 2015 is an indictment of all white people in Charleston, SC.

            More than simply acknowledging the humanity of Muslims, we who follow Jesus are to affirm Muslims as our neighbors.  We believe they are wrong about Jesus.  They see Jesus as a venerated prophet.  We see Jesus as the Son of God, the human incarnation of the second person of the Trinity, and the Savior of the world.  You can’t believe that and be a Muslim.  You can’t not believe it and be a Christian.  The differences are irreconcilable.  Muslims worship the same God we do, but their belief about God, in my view, is wrong.  But the difference I have with my Muslim neighbor, my Muslims friend, should be discussed over a cup of coffee in a friendly environment.  I don’t need to condemn him.  I can befriend him and share God’s love with him.

            As we rode to the airport on our last day in Egypt, the sun was setting and we passed a church, one of the few.  In the fleeing sunlight, I looked at the crosses on the church roof.  I realized how powerfully I felt God’s presence, the Holy Spirit’s hand, there in Cairo, a sprawling Muslim metropolis.  The crosses on the church reminded me God is there.  I and all Christians need to remember God is present in our interactions with Muslims.  God is love.  When we are with our Muslims neighbors and aware of God’s presence, we are to show love through neighborly friendship, welcoming conversation, and Holy Spirit empowered grace. 

---

[i] I put “evangelicals” in quotes because the term is one I really don’t want to surrender.  The perception in America is that evangelicals are white, are people who vote Republican, hate homosexuals and Muslims, and are quick to condemn to Hell anyone whose theology does not align with their fundamentalist hyper-Calvinism.  My definition of evangelical is a person who shares the good news that in Jesus, God had come, the Kingdom is inaugurated, and all who repent of sin and turn to Him can have eternal life in His name.  I put “evangelicals” in quotes because I think true evangelicals are those who lovingly point the world to Jesus, not those who constantly condemn others to Hell.

[ii] http://www.icommittopray.com/request/589/targeted-egyptian-christians/

Lovespeech

            “Whenever speech overwhelms and silences, it is not [an] expression of love.”[i]  When speech is not an expression of love, the speaker does not “affirm the freedom and dignity of the one spoken to, but uses him or her for extrinsic purposes.  Harvard divinity professor, Harvey Cox, makes these comments in an essay in which he draws out a Biblical concept of God in the way he connects speech and love.  The Gospel of John begins, “in the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God” (1:1).  And then verse 14, “the word became flesh and dwelt among us.”  And 1 John 4:16b, “God is love.”  So, God is “word” (logos).  And God is love.  Thus, word is love, or it should be.  “Since God’s love/speech is unqualified, we should love all people regardless of whether they qualify.[ii]

Cox’s essay appears in ‘A Common Word,’ which was first a letter written by Muslim scholars, addressed to Christians worldwide.  The intent was to call Christians and Muslims together around the two commands present in both faiths: love God and love neighbor.  The book by the same title is comprised of essays from scholars of both faiths that further develop the concept of love and how it can, as a topic, be the ground on which Muslims and Christians meet in peace.

Cox insists that love cannot be coerced, only chosen.  We can’t be made to love God.  We choose to because God has overwhelmed us with his freely given love.  But it is that, a gift.  The counter-speech, or “antiparable” to use Cox’s speech is seduction and sorcery.  Seduction does what Cox wrote that it does; it uses people.

He quotes Goethe’s Faust to illustrate his point, but the conversation moves out of the realm of dry academic writing and into the realm of uncomfortable invasion of personal space when we turn the question.  Instead of pointing out how Faust uses people with his speech, we have to ask do we?  Do you?  Have you spoken in ways, whether bullying or deceiving, browbeating or seducing, in order to get someone to do something for your benefit, but not necessarily for theirs?  Have I?  You better believe I have.

I have used speech to run down a woman who turned back my romantic overtures.  I have spoken violently to intimidate my children just to convince myself I was in control.  I have manipulated others for my own ends.  I have used speech to use people.  People are God’s image-bearers and I have sinned by seeing them as tools for my own personal use.  In the thought space of Cox’s essay, that’s seduction, not love.

The second way sin turns love aside is sorcery.  “Sorcery mocks and reverses God’s loving speech.”[iii]  Lovespeech communicates “in ways that preserve and nourish the freedom and dignity of people addressed.”[iv]  Sorcery, robs people of their dignity.  Cox sees three forms of sorcery as it exists in modern practice: propaganda, advertising, and complexification. 

Of these forms of modern word-sorcery, advertising is especially insidious.  Advertising plays on the anxieties that plague people, especially in America.  TV watchers and internet users in America are out of shape, isolated, lonely, and sedentary.  And they (we Americans) know it.  Because we see the emptiness of our own lives, advertisers use beer, shampoo, potato chips, diet plans, dating services, video games, cars, and 1000 other products as ways to rescue us from our anxiety.  The anxiety makes us vulnerable and into the space our own insecurity has carved out, advertisers convince us to spend money we don’t have on products we don’t want or need, products that won’t deliver what the advertiser promised.  Sorcery is the right word for it.

Christians are to speak and listen to lovespeech.  Note the difference.  Sorcery deceives and seduction uses.  In sorcery, humans – God’s image bearers – are pillaged.  In seduction, God’s image bearers are used as tools.  In lovespeech, God’s image bearers are given dignity and helped to flourish.

Cox and the other authors in A Common Word urge Muslims and Christians in the world to work for human flourishing by focusing on love of God and love of neighbor.  Love is essential in bringing together the billions of adherents to these faiths.  Beyond the scope of A Common Word, love softens the hearts of Buddhists and Hindus, Jews and Mormons to one another. 

And in the topic that has been my focus in these blog posts – race relations and Christianity - love is the foundation.  No attempts at justice or reconciliation will be successful without love. 

So, put the question to yourself as you become intention about your own speech.  Let this be an exercise in the day ahead.  Does your speech promote the dignity of the one to whom you speak?  Do your words reveal that you are trying to use that person the way a plumber uses a wrench or other tool?  Is your speech lovespeech, speech that helps the other flourish?  Or, when you talk, is the other being manipulated, led down paths that will lead to his destruction?  Put your own speech to the test.  Jesus, the World made Flesh is our guide and our standard.  May the meditations of our hearts and the words of our mouths be acceptable in his holy sight. 

---

[i] Harvey Cox (2010), “Love and Speech: with Remarks on Seduction and Sorcery” in A Common Word: Muslims and Christians on Loving God and Loving Neighbor, Miroslav Volf, Ghazi bin Muhammad, and Melissa Yarrington, editors, William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company (Grand Rapids), p.166.

[ii] Cox, p.165.

[iii] Cox, p.167. 

[iv] Ibid.